Wings to the Kingdom (Eden Moore #2)

I think he saw us, though he didn’t care and didn’t acknowledge us.

To my left was Benny, openmouthed and staring. He saw them, all the ghosts. He must have. He was breathing them.

To my right Dana was immobile too; but she was watching Green Eyes, and her own eyes gleamed. I couldn’t tell if she was angry, or horrified, or frightened; but the longer I looked at her, the more I thought she must be happy. It was a dismal sort of happiness, more of a vengeful satisfaction than joy. For all her talk of me being irresponsible to cut him loose, she was wishing him on more fervently than I ever could.

He didn’t need any unspoken encouragement from us. He stalked up to the tower, pushing a trash can over and knocking a stone bench onto its side with the merest brush of his knee.

A locked iron gate barred the tower entrance, but not for long. The shooter must have pulled it closed behind himself. It was a useless gesture, and it wouldn’t help him any.

Green Eyes planted two massive fists through the metal latticework and yanked the entire structure clear of the stone—hinges, locks, mounts, and all. He cast it aside and disappeared into the flawless blackness that filled the interior.

I ran after him. I left Dana and Benny where they were, though after a few seconds they opted to follow me. I heard them running through the grass behind me. One of them tripped over the removed gate, or part of a broken bench.

I didn’t wait. I didn’t glance over my shoulder. I wouldn’t have been able to see them anyway.

I followed the big black shape and his illuminated eyes through the portal and into the tall stone coil of the tower interior. I tripped over the first step, which surprised me with its immediacy, but I recovered myself and stumbled up the stairs. Above me I heard the heavy stomping footsteps of the Sentry, who needed no light.

I most definitely did need a light, but when I reached for my flashlight I fumbled it and it clattered onto the ground and down a stair or two. I gasped and dropped to one knee and one hand, but upon feeling around with the other set of fingers I couldn’t find it.

“Eden?” I heard Dana ask from outside. But I didn’t want to wait for her and I didn’t want to slow down, so I left the light and charged on up, knocking my shins on every third sharp stair edge.

I bruised my palms as I dragged them along the infinite spiral of the tower wall, its lumpy and rough-hewn surface beating my knuckles, or my wrists, or the occasional stray knee that collided with it. I had no other means of finding my way.

Every second cycle of circles, a small rectangular window with bars would provide a dim semblance of light.

It wasn’t enough. I fell anyway, battering my elbow, hip, and shoulder. A second fall, close behind, landed me collarbone-down on something sharp and hard—another stair. They came so close together. I couldn’t get a rhythm down to climb them; the corkscrew stylings of the Tower’s guts made it impossible to climb them blind without banging myself up.

“Sentry!” I cried, though whether it was to slow him down or ask his help, I hadn’t decided. Either way, he didn’t answer.

I clamored on, taking the bruises as they came and soldiering forward even as my thighs started to burn from the effort. I had no idea how tall the Tower was; from the outside it was only another phallic monument. From within it seemed to be taller than life.

On I climbed.

There were hundreds of stairs. My legs were aching in earnest. I slowed, catching my breath. Whoever was behind me—whether it was Dana or Benny, I didn’t know—slowed too. I didn’t hear any footsteps behind me.

Up again. Higher. More. How tall could it be?

I heard them talking before I could understand what they were saying. It wasn’t until I was nearly to the top that any of it made any sense at all. Then my head cleared the final hurdle and I could breathe, and I could see. The air above the battlefield was clear, and the sky above was absolutely empty of clouds. The moon was out in half, and it was enough.

I saw them clearly, all three of them.

Jamie was on the ground, clutching his shoulder and backing himself as far against the barricade wall as he could. He was moving slow, and his left arm hung at a funny angle. Back, and back, he scooted—like he was trying to crawl into the wall itself. He saw me, but didn’t say anything.

He tried not to look at me.

Green Eyes was walking the circle, slow and steady, treading his way around the parapet. His flowing hair was caught and teased by the cross breeze that gusted against us all.

And then there was the shooter. He was so much less than I imagined, so much more human than I’d feared. He looked every bit as scared as I would be if I were on the cusp of being trampled by something like the Sentry.

He scooted too, backwards like Jamie had, around the Tower’s deck and towards the stairs.

“You were supposed to leave!” he complained. “This isn’t your place anymore!”

It doesn’t have to be that way, Green Eyes corrected him.

The man cowered—literally, and completely, ducking away and back. He hoisted the gun and put it into the Sentry’s face. It quivered there. “The bargain is up.” The words were barely a breath in the clear, starlit air.

Yes. It is. I am not here because I have to be.

“Then why?”

Because I want to be.

“Back off!” he squealed, shrill and pathetic.

No.

In the course of the man’s retreat he tripped over Jamie, who curled himself as tightly into a ball as he could. That’s it, I thought. Stay down, Jamie. When the man fell over Jamie, he picked himself up and kept moving—back, back, as far away as he could get from the unrelenting sentry.

“I have a right to be here. My people fought here. My people died here too. You can’t keep me away.” And then, when Green Eyes took one long step close, he gasped the rest. “You can’t hurt me! You’re not allowed to. You can’t harm the living, even to guard the dead.”

This gave Green Eyes pause.

While he mulled it over, I crawled up to the very top of the stairs so that my shoulders were exposed to the night air. I stretched out my arm to Jamie, who was fetal a couple of feet away. His head jerked up when I grasped his ankle; but he knew it was me, and he’d never looked so happy to see me. The feeling was mutual. I put my finger up over my lips so he would hush.

He nodded, and slipped down low—offering his good arm out. I took it and pulled, gently but firmly. I drew him towards me, and he let me do it.

Inch by inch, I tugged him across the stone floor. Quietly, I reeled him towards the stairs. I hooked my foot on the topmost step and used it to anchor myself as I leveraged him into the stairway. “I’ve got you,” I breathed so gently he might not have heard me.

That was the bargain.

“Yes, that was the bargain!”

The Sentry looked back down at me, either for affirmation, or because he was seeing me there for the first time. The bargain has ended. I do not owe you safety.

The man’s eyes followed the Sentry’s. For a moment he wobbled and sent the barrel of the gun my way, but reason prevailed and he returned it to the greater threat. He snatched his glance away from us both, and dropped it over the edge of the Tower. Below, he must have seen the army amassed. He must have spied them through the pudding-deep mist, their upturned faces and antiquated clothes.

“You don’t owe them anything, either! This ground holds something of mine, and I want it back—and you’ve got no right to interfere. You’ve got no reason to interfere. Why don’t you just leave?”

Because I don’t want to.

He lunged, faster than any cat, and the man fired his gun directly into the Sentry’s bulk. He was too big a target to miss, but if Green Eyes felt the impact, it didn’t bother him any.

Again, and again, and again, the man fired. He almost emptied the barrel against the huge, hairy creature—even as he was lifted into the air. He kicked, and he jerked. He pushed his foot against the Sentry’s neck.

The shooter had one bullet left by my count, and he was running out of air.

Desperate, he flapped the hand forward and landed the last shot directly into one of those glowing green eyes, the only target that stood out in the dark.

The Sentry roared, though it sounded like no lion I’d ever heard; there was a scream underneath it, something that could have belonged to human or animal, but was certainly neither.

He lifted one great arm to clutch his face, and the other—the clenched fist that held the murderer—flailed hard. He beat the man’s body against the impassable stones of the Tower’s parapet. He thrashed, pushing the man up over the edge and releasing him.

But the man dropped his empty gun and clutched the simian arm, clinging to the limb lest he fall. “No! No!” he shrieked, his voice swaying with the pendulum swing of his body.

Green Eyes ignored the pleas, though it might not have been from callousness. He withdrew the long, sturdy arm that held the man and brought it towards him—a gesture that smashed the man’s head against the faux fortifications.

It might have knocked him out, or it might have only stunned him.

At any rate, he dropped like a stone.

I didn’t hear him cry as he toppled the seven or eight stories down onto the packed earth below. He landed sooner than I expected; if you watch too many movies you expect a dramatic delay.

But no. He was there, clawing at the Sentry’s arm.

Then he thudded on the ground, like a mallet hitting a wet tree.

And Jamie was there, not bleeding, but broken in some way I couldn’t see yet. He was mad, though, which I considered a good sign. When he saw that the shooter had gone over the edge, he sat up and pulled his feet up underneath himself. “This hurts like fuck!” he swore, and the hang of his arm told me he was telling the truth.

And in a moment Dana was beside me, and Benny was behind her.

“What’s happened? Where’d he go?” Dana demanded, but I didn’t answer her. I pulled Jamie almost into my lap, then pushed him past me onto the two newcomers. I climbed up beyond the knot of bodies and went to Green Eyes, who was clutching his face and growling, or grumbling.